Famous Milton Friedman quotes

Is it really true that political self-interest is nobler somehow than economic self-interest? . . . And just tell me where in the world you find these angels who are going to organize society for us.
- Milton Friedman

Concentrated power is not rendered harmless by the good intentions of those who create it.
- Milton Friedman

And what does reward virtue? You think the communist commissar rewards virtue? You think a Hitler rewards virtue? You think, excuse me, if you'll pardon me, American presidents reward virtue? Do they choose their appointees on the basis of the virtue of the people appointed or on the basis of their political clout?
- Milton Friedman

Nothing is as permanent as a temporary government program.
- Milton Friedman

If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there'd be a shortage of sand.
- Milton Friedman

I think that the Internet is going to be one of the major forces for reducing the role of government.
- Milton Friedman

Corruption is government intrusion into market efficiencies in the form of regulations.
- Milton Friedman

The only way that has ever been discovered to have a lot of people cooperate together voluntarily is through the free market. And that's why it's so essential to preserving individual freedom.
- Milton Friedman

See, if you look at the drug war from a purely economic point of view, the role of the government is to protect the drug cartel. That's literally true.
- Milton Friedman

I think almost every economist would agree that government gets itself in trouble when it tries to interfere with voluntary behavior.
- Milton Friedman

There is one and only one social responsibility of business - to use it resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud.
- Milton Friedman

A free man will ask neither what his country can do for him nor what he can do for his country.
- Milton Friedman

Humility is the distinguishing virtue of the believer in freedom; arrogance, of the paternalist.
- Milton Friedman

I'm in favor of legalizing drugs. According to my values system, if people want to kill themselves, they have every right to do so. Most of the harm that comes from drugs is because they are illegal.
- Milton Friedman

When everybody owns something, nobody owns it, and nobody has a direct interest in maintaining or improving its condition. That is why buildings in the Soviet Union - like public housing in the United States - look decrepit within a year or two of their construction…
- Milton Friedman

Only a crisis, actual or perceived, produces real change.
- Milton Friedman

Nobody spends somebody else’s money as carefully as he spends his own.
- Milton Friedman

Believers in aristocracy and socialism share a faith in centralized rule, in rule by command rather than by voluntary cooperation.
- Milton Friedman

I would say that in this world, the greatest source of inequality has been special privileges granted by government.
- Milton Friedman

You cannot be sure that you are right unless you understand the arguments against your views better than your opponents do.
- Milton Friedman